Andrew J. McClurg (University of Memphis) is editing a new series of comparative law texts for Carolina Academic Press. They are seeking authors for various subjects, including property:

Dear Colleagues:

Carolina Academic Press (CAP) is beginning a series of comparative law texts called the “Contextual Approach Series” (CAS). I’m serving as editor. CAP and I are looking for U.S. law professors in a variety of subject areas to serve as lead authors for entries in the series.

The goal of the CAS is to create a series of interesting, student-friendly, self-contained, accessible comparative law books that—using co-authors from the U.S. and two other countries—clearly and concisely explain how law works in practice around the world in different subject areas. The books will be paperbound and roughly 200 pages. The first book, Practical Global Tort Litigation: U.S., Germany and Argentina (McClurg, Koyuncu and Sprovieri) (PGTL), is in publication production and available for use as a model. Detailed guidelines for authors in the series also are available.

As the title of the series suggests, each book will be based on a set of case or problem facts raising prototypical, universal legal issues in the particular subject area. This contextual approach is intended to bring comparative law to life and make it digestible and understandable to law students by giving them a foundation to attach the law to.

As an example, PGTL takes a simple products liability case involving a shattering glass jar through the legal systems of the U.S., Germany, and Argentina. Other examples: a criminal law text could take a simple theft case through the U.S. and two other legal systems; a family law text could take a divorce problem through the U.S. and two other systems; a criminal procedure book could compare the handling of a search, arrest and confession in the U.S. and two other systems; a wills and trusts book could address property disposition upon death in the U.S. and two other legal systems, etc.

The three co-authors will explore and analyze issues raised by the problem facts from the perspective of their respective legal systems in side-by-side country-specific sections.

The U.S. author will serve as the lead author and will enlist, with the editor’s help, the two non-U.S. authors. The U.S. author has primary responsibility for supervising, editing, and integrating the contributions of the non-U.S. authors. This will require learning the relevant law of the two non-U.S. countries. In selecting countries for study, one goal is to choose legal systems that are representative of major world regions, legal traditions or both.

Prospective authors should possess the following: (1) expertise in the relevant subject matter from a U.S. perspective; (2) excellent writing and composition skills; (3) dependability and reliability; (4) an eye for detail in consistency of organizational structure, style, formatting, and citation style; and (5) the time and resources to pursue the project to completion on deadline (roughly 18 months from signing of contract).

A lack of experience or background in comparative law is not a bar if you possess the above qualifications and an interest in studying and learning about other legal systems. The non-U.S. co-authors are expected to provide the primary expertise regarding foreign law. I had no prior background in comparative law before writing PGTL with Adem Koyuncu in Cologne and Luis Sprovieri in Buenos Aires. On the other hand, as a former faculty member at the Florida International University College of Law, I did have access to international resources, which proved essential.

All subjects are open to consideration, although we are particularly interested early on in first-year courses and core upper-level courses.

If you have an interest in becoming an author in this series, please send a preliminary inquiry to amcclurg@memphis.edu that includes: (1) the subject area you would be interested in writing about; (2) a c.v.; and (3) any early ideas you might have regarding a set of problem facts and candidates for the two non-U.S. countries (and co-authors in those countries).

I look forward to hearing from you. When I was teaching at FIU and living in Miami, I became convinced that comparative law will be a cornerstone of U.S. legal education. Writing GPTC was one of the most interesting experiences of my academic career. I learned more than in any year since my first year of law school.

Regards,

Andrew J. McClurgHerbert Herff Chair of Excellence in LawCecil C. Humphreys School of Law The University of Memphis

Ben Barros

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Recently I did a search for Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book. (I know, I know, I should be working on my monument law essay, but I was taking a break.) I've heard about Steal This Book for years, but I'd never known what it was about. You know what: it's available to read in full text on the net. Hmm, why doesn't that surprise me? It's on a tenants' rights website, which propertyprof readers may find of particular interest.

What did surprise me is the content of Steal This Book. I might have guessed it would be about opposition to property rights. It's not what you might expect. At least, it's not what I expected. What I now realize is that it's sort of a how-to manual to put one over on the "system." Some of it's mildly amusing; lots of it is downright anti-social; parts of it are really scary. It's an artifact of the late 1960s. Historians trying to recover the mentality of 1960s radicals will be turning to it.

I didn't know that Hoffman had written parts of it while in jail, which he
identifies as "that graduate school of survival. Here you learn how to
use
toothpaste as glue, . . . and build
intricate communication networks. Here too, you learn the only
rehabilitation possible--hatred of oppression." Hmm.

Listen to how dated this stuff from the introduction on property rights sounds:

The
first section--SURVIVE!--lays out a potential action program for our
new Nation. The chapter headings spell out the demands for a free
society. A community where the technology produces goods and
services for whoever needs them, come who may. It calls on the
Robin Hoods of Santa Barbara Forest to steal from the robber barons
who own the castles of capitalism. It implies that the reader
already is "ideologically set," in that he understands corporate
feudalism as the only robbery worthy of being called "crime," for
it is committed against the people as a whole. Whether the ways it
describes to rip-off shit are legal or illegal is irrelevant. The
dictionary of law is written by the bosses of order. Our moral
dictionary says no heisting from each other. To steal from a
brother or sister is evil.

The continuing controversy regarding Kelo v. City of New London demonstrates that there are a number of problems and tensions associated with eminent domain that entice scholars. This article addresses one such problem: the singular link between eminent domain and affordable housing. Though rarely discussed, this link reveals a long history of cities' use of their eminent domain power to advance development projects that rarely include affordable housing. Moreover, when cities condemn property through eminent domain to further new development projects, they often do so in a manner that undermines many of the goals of building more affordable housing. As the need for affordable housing increases, cities' taking of private property for “public purposes” has helped decrease the number of affordable housing units instead of helping keep up with the demand. Moreover, the two competing views in the ongoing debate regarding the proper definition of a constitutional “public use” both marginalize affordable housing. This interplay between eminent domain and affordable housing raises concerns from a social justice perspective and an economic perspective. This article analyzes the sources and issues that have led to the problems stemming from the link between eminent domain and affordable housing and highlights some potential solutions.

Ben Barros

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In his majority opinion in Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council, Justice Scalia established the relevant background principles of state property law as the reference point for testing whether public regulation or private property goes so far as to constitute a categorical taking of property. He also confirmed, however, that those background principles evolve with new knowledge and changed circumstances.

Over the past decade, the discipline of ecological economics has produced a burgeoning body of research illuminating the significant economic value that functioning ecosystems, acting as natural capital, supply humans in the form of direct and indirect ecosystem services, such as the capacity of coastal wetlands to mitigate storm surges. This article explores how these findings fit into the Lucas calculus.

Based on work by Professor John Sprankling, the Article concludes that the background principles of property law have resisted integrating concepts like natural capital and ecosystem services into property doctrine. On the other hand, based on work by Professor Michael Blumm, the Article confirms that the amassing body of research about natural capital and ecosystem service values is precisely the kind of new knowledge that ought to transform those background principles. The Article concludes by discussing two recent cases in which courts have done exactly that—to integrate knowledge about natural capital and ecosystem service values in order to apply common law property doctrine in ways contrary to the established background principles. If this trend spreads, Lucas will indeed have opened a Pandora's box, with impacts on the common law it is difficult to imagine the Justice Scalia and majority had in mind.

Ben Barros

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The purpose of this project is to get input from you, our readers, about the most important works of scholarship in the various areas of legal inquiry.

Unlike other disciplines, most law academics do not have an advanced degree in "law." For students pursuing a Ph.D in areas such as economics, history, or social psychology, they must pass comprehensive exams showing that they have a broad knowledge of the most important works in the field. It is only after comps that students go on to complete their specialized dissertation research.

Legal academia assumes that entry-level candidates and new scholars have done the background research necessary for their area of expertise. But it is left to the individual to get this knowledge. Certainly, the J.D. provides a baseline, and mentors are helpful in providing further direction. But there is nothing akin to comps that sets forth a comprehensive listing for new folks to follow. Many of us have heard the question, in the AALS interview, in the job talk, or as a new scholar presenting a paper: "Well, of course, you have read the work of Prof. X in this area, right?" Failure to respond appropriately to this question may raise eyebrows and cast doubt on the scholar's research.

The Research Canons project is intended to fill this gap.

Property and Real Estate will be up for canonical treatment on Wednesday, 9/13. [UPDATE: the property canons post is now up on PrawfsBlawg]. Property isn't the most cohesive of legal subjects, so I suspect the list will be all over the place. I'll give this more thought over the next few days, but here are some of my candidates:

The Classics of the Moral and Political Theory of Property

Locke, On PropertyRousseau, Discourse on InequalityBentham, The Theory of LegislationMarx, Communist Manifesto

Margaret Jane Radin, "Property and Personhood" and Contested CommoditiesJoseph William Singer, “The Reliance Interest in Property”Hernando de Soto, The Mystery of CapitalCharles A. Reich, “The New Property”Milton Friedman, Capitalism and FreedomWilliam Fischel, The HomeVoter HypothesisRonald Coase, "The Problem of Social Cost"Garrett Hardin, "The Tragedy of the Commons"Harold Demsetz, "Toward a Theory of Property Rights"Lots of articles by Carol Rose and Richard Epstein -- it is hard to pick just one or two

Takings and Constitutional Property

James Madison, "Property"Joseph Sax, "Takings and the Police Power"Frank Michelman, "Property, Utility and Fairness"Bruce Ackerman, Private Property and the ConstitutionRichard Epstein, TakingsWilliam Michael Treanor, "The Original Understanding of the Takings Clause and Political Process"

Ben Barros

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When I was in college, my grandfather and I had some conversations about the American flag. He was a World War II veteran, and took the flag as a symbol very seriously. I was more ambivalent, not disliking or disrespecting the flag itself but suspicious of the often mindless patriotism that seemed to be associated with the flag as a public symbol. Five years ago, living in the West Village about a mile and a half north of the World Trade Center, my view of the flag radically changed. I'm still not a fan of empty-headed flag-waving patriotism, but to me the flag now symbolizes something that to a WWII veteran like my grandfather would be self evident: that despite our profound differences and the every-day petty squabbling of our political class, we can stand as one when we need to.

Ben Barros

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